Where Is Michael Peterson Now? What to Know About The Staircase Subject's Life Today, 8 Years After He Was Freed from Prison By Skyler Caruso and Nicole Pomarico

Michael Peterson was convicted of killing his wife, Kathleen Peterson, but that was just the beginning of the long story that would eventually inspire a HBO Max miniseries.

Michael, a novelist and military veteran, was sentenced to life in prison in October 2003 for the murder of his wife, Kathleen, who died on the stairs in their Durham, N.C., home in December 2001. The story inspired the 2022 HBO Max miniseries The Staircase, which is now available on Netflix.

The series is just one of several retellings of the chilling case, including Netflix’s 2018 docuseries of the same name. HBO Max’s rendition strived to reveal untold sides and different angles of the harrowing story, with Colin Firth portraying Michael opposite Toni Collette as Kathleen.

In December 2011, the judge in Michael’s case granted him a new trial, citing an untrustworthy witness. In February 2017, he was officially freed.

So, where is Michael Peterson now? Here’s everything to know about his life today.

Who is Michael Peterson?

Michael was born in Nashville in 1943 before moving to work for the U.S. Department of Defense after college. He later met his first wife, Patricia Sue, an elementary school teacher, in West Germany. They wed in 1968 and had two boys together, Todd and Clayton.

After serving in the Vietnam War, he began to write novels and newspaper columns about his experiences following his honorable discharge in 1971. While living together, Michael and Patricia became close with their neighbors-turned-friends George and Elizabeth Ratliff.

CNN reported that George died from a military accident in 1983, and in 1985, Elizabeth was found dead at the foot of her staircase with head injuries.

Michael and Patricia later divorced. Not long after, he moved in with telecoms executive Kathleen Atwater before eventually tying the knot in 1997.

On Dec. 9, 2001, Kathleen was found unconscious at the bottom of their staircase in Durham, N.C. She was later pronounced dead.

What crimes did Michael Peterson commit?

Michael dialed 911 after finding Kathleen at the base of their steps.

According to Detective Art Holland of Durham police (via NBC News), Kathleen was “splayed out on the floor, her head resting on the landing of a back staircase” — details that sparked suspicion due to the close similarities to Elizabeth’s death in 1985.

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Michael suggested that Kathleen fell down the stairs after drinking too much alcohol and Valium, but no fingerprints were detected on the wine bottle or glasses out in the kitchen.

After a medical examiner noticed several lacerations on her scalp, prosecutors concluded that Kathleen was bludgeoned to death. The dried blood atop her head was a clue that she’d been there for a while, and since Michael was the only person in the house at that time, he was the prime suspect.

What was Michael Peterson’s sentence?

The prosecution suggested that Michael killed his wife after they got into a fight supposedly initiated by Kathleen’s discovery of more than 2,000 explicit images of men on Michael’s computer. Emails in conversation with a young male escort he was planning on reuniting with after meeting a few months prior were also found.

The defense, however, disputed that Kathleen was accepting of Michael’s bisexuality, as WRAL News reported, and that the blow poke (a hollow tube instead of a solid metal stick) he allegedly used to strike her suffered no damage, nor had any remnants of blood on it.

On Oct. 10, 2003, the jury found Michael guilty of Kathleen’s murder and sentenced him to life without the possibility of parole.

Where is Michael Peterson now?

In December 2011, Judge Orlando Hudson ordered a retrial after an investigation found that testimony from star witness Duane Deaver, a State Bureau of Investigation crime lab agent, was “materially misleading” and “deliberately false,” per The News & Observer.

In February 2017, Michael submitted an Alford plea to voluntary manslaughter, which meant that he admitted there’s enough evidence to convict him, but not admit guilt for committing the crime. He was sentenced to time served and officially freed.

Now, Michael continues to reside in Durham, but has since sold the house where Kathleen died. (The house was on the market for $1.9 million, according to ABC 11 News.)

He had been living with his ex-wife, Patricia, for two years until her death from a heart attack, his son Clayton told The News & Observer in April 2021.

“He’s in a ground floor apartment with no stairs — that was a really important accommodation,” his defense attorney David Rudolf said of his former client at CrimeCon in New Orleans, per Oxygen.